End of ADS-L Digest - 18 Jun 1995 to 19 Jun 1995
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There are 7 messages totalling 191 lines in this issue.
Topics of the day:
1. Maps (2)
2. Semester System Requirements
3. Hot as toffit (fwd) (2)
4. S-W Va. Blue Ridge dialect
5. Hot as toffit
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Date: Tue, 20 Jun 1995 09:44:55 -0400
From: "William A. Kretzschmar, Jr."
Subject: Re: Maps
I am not aware of any recent attempts to draw a New York City dialect
area. Carver's 1987 *American Regional Dialects* (with DARE evidence from
the 70s) doesn't do it, but does mention Metro New York in several places.
Labov has treated New York as a dialect in his work on modern urban sound
change (his *Principles of Linguistic Change*, Blackwell 1994, will give
pretty comprehensive references). Aside from those two, studies I know
come from before the 1960s.
Whether or not Bayonne, NJ, belongs to a putative NYC dialect or not
seems to me to ask for sharp boundaries where none are to be expected.
The entire NYC-Philadelphia corridor seems to be pretty heavily populated
with people who work in either NYC or Philadelphia, so one might expect
heavy influences from the big cities throughout the region (of course
more influences the closer one is to either city).
The expectation that any nameable community has its own speech is quite
natural, and probably demonstrable if it were possible to do an intensive
study of each such place. However, as soon as we get to comparisons
between places, we are in the realm of frequencies, of how much one place
resembles or differs from another within the larger category of American
English, or within the even larger category of English speakers. The
notion that different places are really separate from each other within
such a broader context is a chimera. We believe that separately nameable
places should have "different" speech, but the belief does not make it so.
Certainly there will be some differences in the frequency of certain
linguistic characteristics, and there may even be some rare qualitatively
distinguishing features---but these don't make for good boundaries.
Regards, Bill
******************************************************************************
Bill Kretzschmar Phone: 706-542-2246
Dept. of English FAX: 706-542-2181
University of Georgia Internet: billk[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]hyde.park.uga.edu
Athens, GA 30602-6205 Bitnet: wakjengl[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]uga